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what angels do

July 11, 2017

It’s been a year since I’ve blogged, a lot has happened since my last post – but I’m not gonna dive into everything at once. Like people do, I got carried away in other aspects. College classes kept me busy along with my part-time job, I accidentally started a small business and I closed my small business online, some family tragedies took place, and life just happened. I’ve grown so much in the past year, and day by day I’ve just been winging it. Which is why I’m back, because we are all winging it, that’s what angels do.

Naturally, we have our own plans and goals and we are doing our best to reach them, dealing with the cards we are dealt at the time. We would all like to think that everything we do and every choice we make is part of the big scheme in our head to get where we want to be, but realistically no one has any idea what they’re doing at a given time or how to get exactly where they want to go. We are winging it.

“Do what you can with what you have where you are”

In January of this year I accidentally started my own business. I say accidentally because I had no idea I would ever wake up one day owning a business, let alone my idea to make my own neon sign for my bedroom could turn into a business. It was after I made my own sign and my close friends and some acquaintances told me that they really liked it and wanted their own, that at midnight on January 18th I opened my own shop, BrightSideDesignTX on Etsy.com. That same night I had orders coming in from around the country!

I essentially didn’t have any real confidence that this business of mine was gonna lead me to riches or take off whatsoever, but pretty soon I was receiving more orders for my signs than I could take the time to fill! This one-woman operation was under a lot of stress juggling school, my part-time job and this part-time business! I would make neon signs in any and all free time I had and told myself that I was just gonna wing it, riding out this business as long as I could – and that’s exactly what I did.

“good vibes” custom made neon sign.

I decided that because my business was going so well I wouldn’t need to pile another part-time job on top of it in the summer. My orders were consistent and coming from all over the country. My signs were going better places than I was! Business was going great up until summer came around and I began bringing in less and less new orders each week. I had also encountered the dark side of retail, in that I realized that not everyone who received my signs had nice words to say.

What some people failed to understand, or read the listing I would say, is that unlike blown-glass neon signs that run upwards of $200-$800, I was selling neon signs made out of Electro-luminescent wire (EL wire) attached to a base wire for stability. The el wire gave the signs a bright glow which came in any color you wanted, the sign could read whatever you wished it to say, and was the same size as most neon signs sold on Amazon or Urban Outfitters. The best part, because the sign was made from el wire instead of blown glass, the cost was $80-$110 – obviously a dramatic difference. Still though, I received 3 too many bad reviews from (hardcore mean) people who believed they were getting blown glass or a gigantic neon sign.

I’m no professional business owner, so when people had negative things to say about the signs I was personally making, it would really tear me down – enough to make me close the shop and never want to do it again. I had no idea what I was doing when I started BrightSideDesignTX, it wasn’t ever my plan, nor did I do anything but wing it the entire time it was open. However, I did it and for a good while it worked out really well, which is all I could’ve asked for.

“Thing usually don’t happen the way you imagine they will.”

I never wanted to start a business, but I want to graduate college, I want to be a news anchor, I want to live in a big city and marry the man of my dreams – yet everyday I’m just winging it and I know that everyday for the rest of my life I’ll be winging it. There is a bigger plan for all of us, but we have no clue what that is. We are not in control of our fate. We take life day by day, most days just trying to get through it. Our inner guts point us in the direction we feel appropriate, and we hope like hell we just chose the wiser of the options.

“If it comes; let it. If it goes; let it.”

I think it’s important to recognize that we are just out here winging it at life, giving it our best go or maybe just a go. It’s important because it humanizes us. You aren’t supposed to have it all figured out, no one actually does. You also don’t need to stress and compare where you are with others, no one has it all figured out, and everyone has to start somewhere. You just need to know that you were put on Earth with a purpose, a reason, and a tiny pair of invisible wings to get you where you need to be. So don’t be afraid to be like the angels and wing it till you get there.